


The Need for Change

by unorigelnal (jayburding)



Series: The Hobbit Dæmon AU [1]
Category: The Hobbit (2012), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemon, Angst, Canonical Character Death, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-02
Updated: 2013-01-02
Packaged: 2017-11-23 08:17:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/620009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jayburding/pseuds/unorigelnal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A Hobbit dæmon AU, as asked for over <a href="http://hobbit-kink.livejournal.com/702.html?thread=538814#t538814">here</a> at the kinkmeme.</p><p>Thorin and his dæmon Rathwith at the battle for Moria.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Need for Change

“Khazâd ai-mênu!”

The dæmon screamed into a dive as an eagle and tore the smirk from an orc’s face with her talons, ploughing straight through another as she sought to gain altitude again. The tug of the bond forced her into a tight circle, and she soared right over Thorin’s head and screeched murder in the ears of the orcs facing him. The foul creatures fell back before their combined fury and right into the path of Dwalin and Mótsognir as the pair stormed through.

Rathwith passed over the two, briefly grasping Mótsognir’s horns as the ibex reared up and using her as a lift off point to get above the clash of hammers and axes. The grey flash of Thror’s Mjothvitnir passed her on the left and Rathwith rolled in the air to come up alongside her, carving up the face of an orc that dared to threaten the wolfhound.

“Careful, Mjoth,” she screeched.

“Mind yourself, Rath!” the hound growled back through a mouthful of goblin.

Thror’s voice sounded above the din as they wheeled to return, and the looming figure of the pale orc marked himself amongst the throng. Rathwith rose again as Mjothvitnir turned back and carved through the orcs between herself and Thror, the two of them taken by the same sudden fear. The eagle’s sharp eyes sought Thorin out amongst the masses and she dropped down beside him, flooring an orc at his back in the process.

The next they knew, Thror fell before Azog, Mjothvitnir pinned beneath the orc’s foot, her frantic teeth carving his flesh to ribbons and yet unable to free herself.

Mjothvitnir vanished mid-howl, swallowed up in a swirl of gold dust as the pale orc held Thror’s head high. Rathwith jumped free of Thorin as the grisly sight unfolded, and felt something in herself change as their mixed battle cry tore through the air. 

Rathwith plummeted from the sky and struck at Azog’s head, scratching and tearing at his face with beak and talons, eager to take his eyes and ensure that the furious revenge of Durin was the last thing the vile murderer ever saw.

He snarled and beat her back, crushing the eagle to the ground with a lucky strike from the blunt end of his weapon. Rathwith lay stunned, Azog’s roar of triumph ringing in her ears as the weapon descended again-

And was deflected by the sudden solid presence of herself. Thorin caught the weapon against his oaken shield and threw it back in Azog’s face, desperation and rage lending him strength where his own had been flagging.

Rathwith scrambled free as Thorin drove the pale orc back, and gained the air again with help from Mótsognir, the ibex dropping her head so Rathwith could grasp her horns and all but threw the eagle back into the air. She screeched in renewed fury and dove for Azog once more as Thorin pressed him back.

Rathwith claimed his eye as Thorin took his arm.

She saw him reach for her as the pale orc retreated, but a brush of her pinions over his fingers was all the acknowledgement she could offer him before the battle overtook them again.

The battle was long over before they managed to speak. Rathwith set herself as sentry, soaring over the battlefield as their diminished numbers did what they could for the dead. Funeral fires scorched the air with smoke until the darkening sky was little more than the grey taste of death and ash.

Thorin called her down from where she rode the edge of the bond’s range, watching over the remnants of their mighty house as they finally retreated from the gates of Khazad-dûm, and she could not refuse him. She dropped down to him, felt the stretch of the bond loosen, and alighted on his glove as gently as she could. They allowed a moment to relish the comfort of their closeness before either spoke.

“Still this shape, Rathwith?” Thorin eventually asked, rather than the myriad other questions that bubbled beneath the surface in both of them. The touch of his hand against her wings questioned as much as it soothed her rumpled, smoke stained feathers.

The eagle could not look at him, but turned to cast her keen gaze over the weaving train of dwarves vanishing into the twilight as the road ahead consumed them.

“This is me,” she said, and wondered how it felt to break your own heart this way.

“… oh,” was all he could say, but the glove that held her trembled, and it was not from fatigue at holding her.

“I’m sorry,” she said, seared near breathless with shame. Better to have worn cloven hooves like Mótsognir or velvet pads like Aurvang, better even to have Jari’s tiny paws. Anything but the talons and wings of a creature bound to a world where the empty sky went on and on above them without end, a creature who wandered on the wind, bound to only the most fleeting of homes. Birds were elven dæmons, not for the deep rooted children of Aulë.

Thorin did not speak, but the storm of his grief had renewed in the darkness of his eyes. When Rathwith moved to leave he did not stop her, and the eagle rose into the dark, struggling for the sky and hating it with every foot she gained.

The mew of her grieving cry overhead mourned for many things that night.


End file.
